


Premonition

by labocat



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/F, Gen, Murder, Tarot, psychic powers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-23
Updated: 2019-10-23
Packaged: 2020-12-31 19:49:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21151235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/labocat/pseuds/labocat
Summary: All Ali wanted was to draw, in the beginning.





	Premonition

**Author's Note:**

  * For [snowshus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/snowshus/gifts).

The call came at midnight, rousing me from sleep.

I’d expected it - I’d finished the three of swords earlier that afternoon without anything out of the ordinary: no flashes, no visions, no stray cats turning up on my doorstep with gifts. I usually didn’t mind working on the minor arcana - there were fewer ripples than when I worked on the major arcana cards, or at least fewer that came to my attention.

Sometimes they’d come as I drew the cards, the shape of the thing to come sketched out with my pencil, the brought to life with the inks. The pentacles were my favorites, glimpses into lives and small acts of kindness that made me eager to draw the next card, or at the very least, bolster me through the fours. Each deck I thought it would be easier if I were able to plan which order I drew the cards in, but that didn’t seem to be my lot in life. The cards came to me, rather than the other way around, no matter how hard I tried.

It had taken me a couple decks to realize what was happening, that the scenes for each deck weren’t normal artistic inspiration striking out of the blue. It had been a wedding that made me first wonder, a picture in the paper of an angle I’d penned just the day before. I was ready to write it off as a coincidence, but something about the way the decorations had draped off of the arches had caught my eye, exactly as I’d drawn them, down to one an instant away from sliding off. I’d imagined it falling, the laughter that would have filled the hall as it was a happy day, a happy ground of people in my mind, glad to have come this far with people they loved. That had been a nine of cups. The next card I drew, a six of wands, I paid attention. To each detail as it emerged. As I paid more attention, I recognized more, to the point that I could all but see the scene as it played out in front of me: a graduation, with details and colors that I recognized as the local university, the graduates’ faces a mix of determination, excitement, and fear as they faced the next stage of their lives, even though graduation was weeks away yet.

I came to recognize when the cards would try and get my attention as I was drawing, a general sense as I moved through the process - not every card was someone’s life, something which helped let me feel like I still had some shred of creativity left, rather than being used as some vessel - but sometimes it would only come once the ink was drying, that I’d know what I’d drawn was true. 

Sometimes it was like tonight - the sense as I finished that there was something about the card, dreading the confirmation. I wanted to believe I only saw the events as I drew them, had nothing to do with bringing them into effect, but some cards were easier to ignore than others.

I knew the scene before I arrived: three shots to the chest, splayed out on the floor. I turned away instantly, the emotions that had roiled up in my chest as I’d been drawing coming to a head. Betrayal and the building resentment, the guilt from both sides carried for years, an argument boiled over. His boyfriend, I would guess; I gave my statement, the sergeant or who was familiar with me so thankfully just wrote down my impressions, and bailed, losing my dinner halfway down the stairs. All the years I’d been drawing, it never got any easier.

The first time, I’d wondered why me. I’d known from almost the start of the card that it was real, emotions that weren’t my own choking my throat and blurring my eyes with tears even as my hand continued to move, but I’d still held off from going to the police. Maybe I was wrong, I told myself, as I huddled in blankets and tried not to think about the finished card sitting on my desk. Maybe it was all in my head after all, some sort of artist’s sensitivity about their subject. People talked about that sort of thing.

People talked about the blood-splattered apartment of the mayor a lot more.

It had been worse than I thought: my card was a narrow view, of the mayor himself, lying on the floor. I’d missed the rest of the scene, and though most of the blood had dried by the time I’d turned up at the police station, crying through an explanation none of them believed but filled with enough details the papers hadn’t offered that I’d had to be taken seriously just in case, the horror of the scene itself couldn’t be forgotten. I still shuddered when I was about to start the eight of cups, even now.

By now, I was used to wiping my mouth, popping a mint and chewing it quickly on my way out. As I was halfway down the steps, the detective on scene stopped me, a gentle smile on her face. “Dinner tomorrow?” she offered, and I gave a weak smile in return, knowing she meant well but unable to stomach even the thought of food right now.

“We’ll see. I’ve already got an outline for the nine of swords and I have a bad feeling about it.”

“All the more reason to eat with me.” Miki reached her hand out towards mine and I let her pat it, the touch grounding me somewhat. I could almost imagine the smell of her soap chasing away the smell of dried blood in my nose. “You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to; I’ll regale you with what the Captain’s gotten up to now, but if you do have something for me and it’ll help to not keep it bottled up, I’m more than happy to hear. You don’t have to bear this alone, Ali.”

I squeezed her hand briefly and tried my best at a smile. I knew the curve of hers, the way it would look when she ducked her head as she brushed her hair back behind her ear. It was on the two of cups that I’d been delaying on finishing, not wanting to relinquish it to anyone until I absolutely had to, a small glimpse of the future that I didn’t mind having. For once. For now, I had an apartment to return to, a desk and inks waiting for me.

“Tomorrow, Miki, I promise.” I’d have something for her then, a stepping stone in the road to a future I wanted to earn but didn’t know how. Part of me wanted to trust the cards, and part of me wanted to run far away, but I knew I’d be there tonight, drawing and seeing, both good and bad, for that was my fate.


End file.
